Was Jesus nailed through the palms or through the wrists?

The earliest artistic witnesses

The oldest visual documents of the Crucifixion show the nails in the palms. The British Museum holds an ivory from Rome dated to about 420-430 (Maskell collection, shelfmarks 1856,0623.4-7: one of the four Passion panels) depicting the Crucifixion with the nails visibly in the palms^[1]. The wooden door of Santa Sabina in Rome, commonly dated to the early 5th century (around 430-432), likewise shows nails at the centre of the hands — according to P. Casey, whose article is an online apologetic publication, not peer-reviewed^[2]. These visual testimonies are not mere conventions: they belong to an iconographic tradition fixed from the 5th century onward, four centuries after the Passion.

In surviving Christian art, from the 5th century until the anatomical debates of the 20th century, the known depictions place the nails in the palms. This remarkable consistency is in itself an argument. The great religious artistic traditions are not the product of individual fancy: they transmit a collective memory kept by the Church.

The scriptural texts

The Gospels designate the nailed hands by the Greek word χεῖρας (cheiras), which ordinarily means hands — without specifying palm or wrist. Several passages nevertheless offer valuable clues.

"Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe." — Saint John, Gospel of John 20:25^[3]

"See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself!" — Saint Luke, Gospel of Luke 24:39^[4]

Thomas does not say: "unless I see the nail marks in his wrists", but: "in his hands". He then places his finger "into the mark of the nails" — a gesture one may associate with the palm, visible and accessible, rather than with the wrist: a simple indication of fittingness, not a proof, since the text specifies neither one location nor the other^[5].

The prophet Zechariah had announced seven centuries earlier:

"And if one asks him: 'What are these wounds on your chest?' he will answer: 'I received them in the house of those who loved me.'" — Zechariah 13:6 (liturgical translation)^[6]

The Hebrew here reads בֵּין יָדֶיךָ (bein yadeykha), literally "between your hands" or "between your arms" — and not "in your hands": this verse therefore does not locate the wounds in the palms. It remains a traditional indication — wounds received "in the house of those who loved me", shown and questioned afterwards — but on its own it proves neither palm nor wrist.

Psalm 22 (21), read by the whole Christian tradition as a messianic prophecy, carries in verse 16 a famous and difficult Hebrew reading: כָּאֲרִי (ka'ari), "like a lion" — "like a lion [they enclose] my hands and my feet", in the pointed Masoretic text^[7]. The Septuagint (ὤρυξαν, "they dug, pierced") and the Vulgate (foderunt, "they pierced"), both earlier than this pointing, read a verb: "they pierced my hands and my feet" — the reading received by the whole Christian tradition. The difficulty remains in the Masoretic Hebrew, but it changes nothing in the case file: the Hebrew yad (יָד) designates the hand as a whole, without specifying palm or wrist — this verse, on its own, therefore does not settle the location.

In the ordinary usage of the New Testament, the Greek word χεῖρας (cheiras) designates the hand — without specifying palm or wrist — while the specific anatomical term for the wrist is καρπός (karpos)^[8]. Barbet himself acknowledged this linguistic point by proposing to broaden the anatomical definition of "hand" to include the wrist — a defensible position in an anatomical context, but one that runs against the natural and ordinary sense of the term in the texts.

The testimony of Saint Bridget of Sweden

Among the private revelations, Saint Bridget of Sweden (d. 1373) reports having seen the hands of Christ nailed "there where the bone was most solid"^[9]. This formulation was used by Barbet as an argument for the wrists, where the carpal bones do indeed form a resistant base. But Zugibe showed in turn that this description applies equally to the deep palm, between the second and third metacarpals, where the bony structure is likewise robust^[10].

The man and his experiments

Pierre Barbet (1883-1961)^[11] was a surgeon at the Saint-Joseph hospital in Paris. A convinced Catholic, he took an interest in the Shroud of Turin and undertook in the 1930s a series of anatomical experiments to understand how the Crucifixion was mechanically possible. He published the results of his research under the title Un médecin au Calvaire (Dillen, Paris, 1950), translated into English as A Doctor at Calvary (Doubleday, 1953)^[12].

"I soon realized that the nail in the palm, where I believed it had to be, could not hold there for long. The skin tore rapidly under the weight of the body." — Pierre Barbet, Un médecin au Calvaire, Dillen, Paris, 1950, p. 104^[13]

Barbet conducted his experiments on cadavers: he drove nails into various parts of the hand and suspended the body to simulate the crucified position. He found that the palms gave way rapidly, the nail tearing the flesh, whereas nails driven through the wrist-carpus area did not tear.

The only crucifixion victim identified by archaeology

Only one archaeological case of Roman crucifixion has ever been identified with certainty. In 1968, excavations at Giv'at ha-Mivtar (north of Jerusalem) uncovered the ossuary of a 1st-century man, Yehohanan ben Hagkol, who died crucified^[14]. His calcaneum (heel bone) still bore an iron nail 11.5 cm long and about 1 cm wide, definitively confirming that Roman crucifixion used nails — and not ropes alone — to fix the feet.

For the hands, the situation is far less clear. The anatomist Nicu Haas, who analysed the bones in 1970, noted a mark on the radius (forearm bone) that might indicate the passage of a nail^[15]. But a re-evaluation by Joe Zias and Eliezer Sekeles in 1985 concluded that this interpretation remained uncertain: the exact position of the nail in Yehohanan's hands could not be established with certainty from the preserved bones^[16]. This discovery confirms the use of nails for the feet, but does not settle the palm/wrist question for the hands — the small bones of the carpus and metacarpals rarely survive in a condition allowing precise anatomical reading.

Destot's space

Barbet identified an anatomical space on the ulnar side of the carpus (wrist), between the lunate, the capitate, the hamate and the triquetral bones — a region known since as Destot's space^[17]. In this space, a nail can pass through the hand without damaging any bone and without causing immediate mortal haemorrhage.

The retraction of the thumb and the Shroud

Barbet's most striking argument is anatomical: when he drove a nail through Destot's space, the median nerve was injured, causing an automatic and immediate retraction of the thumb toward the palm^[18]. Yet on the image of the Shroud of Turin, the thumbs are not visible — as if the retraction had hidden them under the hand. For Barbet, this is a decisive confirmation: had the nails been in the palms, the thumbs would be visible on the Shroud^[19].

This detail — the absence of the thumb on the Shroud — was noted as early as the Middle Ages. Jean-Christian Petitfils, in his analysis of the famous Pray manuscript (Budapest, c. 1192-1195), observes that the Entombment scene depicts Christ with crossed hands, the thumbs not visible, folded inside the palms^[20] — a detail found nowhere else in the general iconographic tradition and explicable only by direct knowledge of the Shroud of Turin.

This observation has been taken up as a strong argument for the authenticity of the Shroud in French-language apologetic literature, including modern presentations^[21]. It forms a direct link between the location of the nails and the question of the authenticity of the Shroud.

The man and the method

Frederick T. Zugibe (1928-2013), chief medical examiner of Rockland County (New York State), is the author of The Cross and the Shroud (Exposition Press, 1982; revised ed. Paragon House, 1988)^[22]. Zugibe was both a rigorous scientist and a practising Catholic. His work corrects Barbet on three fundamental points, after experiments conducted on living volunteers — not on cadavers.

First objection: cadavers are not living bodies

Zugibe's methodological criticism is decisive: Barbet conducted his experiments on cadaveric hands. Yet the tissues of a cadaver are fundamentally different from living tissues. The tendons and supporting structures of a living hand are far more resistant than those of a cadaver in the course of rigor or decomposition^[23]. Zugibe repeated similar experiments on living volunteers and found that the palms, correctly loaded, can support considerable weight — up to 100 kg for several minutes — without tearing^[24].

"Barbet's experiments were performed on cadavers. When I placed nails through the deep palm on live volunteers, the results were entirely different." — Frederick T. Zugibe, The Cross and the Shroud, Paragon House ed., 1988, p. 47^[25]

Second objection: the position of the image on the Shroud

The image of the hands on the Shroud shows a wound mark located not on the ulnar side (the little-finger side — where Destot's space lies), but on the median side, at the base of the wrist. Zugibe argues that this position corresponds better to a nail driven through the deep palm, between the second and third metacarpals, than to a nail in Destot's space^[26].

The following table compares the two theories on this point:

Third objection: the thumb on the Shroud

For Barbet, the absence of the thumb on the Shroud proves the lesion of the median nerve (hence the nail in the wrist). Zugibe refutes this reasoning by explaining that at the moment of death, as the muscles relax and the body cools, the wrists flex naturally — causing the thumbs to retract independently of any nerve lesion^[27]. This explanation requires no median nerve lesion and therefore does not confirm the wrist.

Zugibe's position and the stigmata

Zugibe's thesis places the nail in the palm, between the bases of the second and third metacarpals, in the lower central part of the hand. This position is perfectly consistent with the location of Padre Pio's stigmata — whose wounds, observed by many physicians, lay in line with the index and middle fingers, not on the ulnar side^[28]. It is also consistent with sixteen centuries of surviving Christian art (since the 5th century).

What the Shroud shows

The Shroud of Turin offers an image of the two crossed hands, the right hand over the left. The image shows:

• Left hand: a wound mark visible at the base of the dorsal face of the wrist or the top of the palm — the wound Barbet says is in Destot's space, and Zugibe says is at the base of the palm.
• Hands: the thumbs are not visible in the image of either hand.
• Right hand: it partly covers the left hand and its wound is less directly visible.

The exact location of the wound is the subject of technical debate among anatomists and sindonologists. What can be stated with certainty: the wound is visible on the inner face of the wrist/base of the palm of the left hand, and no wound appears at the centre of the palm in the area where one would see it on a traditional artistic portrait^[29].

The question of authenticity

The authenticity of the Shroud of Turin is the subject of a separate article. For the question of the nails, let us retain this point: if the Shroud is authentic, the wound it shows on the left hand lies in an area corresponding either to Destot's space or to the deep palm in Zugibe's sense — both theories are compatible with the image of the Shroud, and the Shroud alone does not settle the debate^[30].

What is certain, on the other hand, is that the image of the Shroud does not show both hands with identical and symmetrical wounds. The left hand seems to present the wound higher than one would expect from a central palm wound. If this asymmetry is real — and not an artefact of the image or of the draping of the cloth — it could count as evidence for the harmonious theory developed below.

Anne Catherine Emmerich: the right palm and the dislocated left arm

Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824), Augustinian nun of Dulmen (Westphalia), stigmatic and blessed since 3 October 2004, left detailed visions of the Passion of Christ, transcribed by the poet Clemens Brentano and published under the title La Douloureuse Passion de Notre-Seigneur Jésus-Christ (first edition: Sulzbach, 1833)^[31]. An essential caveat: the cause of beatification — suspended in 1928 because of Brentano's literary mediation, reopened in 1973 — explicitly set aside the writings transmitted by Brentano from its examination; the beatification concerns the heroic virtues of the nun and in no way guarantees the accuracy of these narratives (see the article Anne Catherine Emmerich)^[32]. These visions therefore do not belong to the realm of dogma — private revelations are not binding on faith — but they constitute a mystical testimony that deserves to be examined seriously, especially when it coincides with independent archaeological and anatomical data.

Emmerich's description of the agony of the Crucifixion is of remarkable surgical precision. For the right hand, the text is explicit:

"I saw the executioners throw Jesus onto the cross, and soldiers held him. They stretched his right arm onto the arm of the cross, and an executioner tied his wrist. Another executioner, wearing a leather apron, took from a bag a long nail and pressed its point into the palm of his hand. Jesus closed his eyes convulsively. The point of the nail entered the flesh, and the executioner seized his hammer and struck." — Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, La Douloureuse Passion de Notre-Seigneur Jésus-Christ, from the meditations of A.-C. Emmerich, Sulzbach, 1833, Fr. transl. by Abbé de Cazalès, chap. XXXIV^[33]

The description could not be clearer: into the palm of that hand. The right hand of Christ was nailed through the palm. That is the right-side nail.

But that is not the end of the scene. For the left hand, Emmerich describes something radically different, which will explain everything else:

"They noticed that the other hand could not reach the hole bored in the left arm of the cross; so they tied ropes to the left arm of Jesus and, bracing their feet against the cross, pulled it until the hand reached the place of the nail. His arms were dislocated, his chest heaved convulsively, and his whole body was in torment." — Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, La Douloureuse Passion, ibid.^[34]

This passage is pivotal. It is not a spiritual metaphor, but a precise mechanical description: the cross had been pre-bored with a hole too far away, so that the outstretched left arm could not reach its place. The executioners had to pull the arm with ropes to the point of dislocation. Under these conditions, the position of the nail in the left hand is no longer the same as in the right hand: the arm being stretched beyond its natural range, the wrist ends up at or beyond the level of the palm, and the nail must be driven through the upper part of the hand — the wrist or carpal area.

Emmerich adds, after the fixing of the second arm:

"His arms were dislocated and pulled out of their joints. The shoulders of the Saviour had widened under the traction; his chest had dilated and his loins sank down."^[35]

This sentence echoes Psalm 22 (21), verse 15: "I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint"^[36]. It also corresponds to a known anatomical fact: a forced traction of the upper limb to the point of shoulder dislocation mechanically produces a lengthening of the arm that shifts all the anatomical landmarks. In this configuration, the anchor point of the nail naturally ends up closer to the wrist than to the central palm.

Maria Valtorta: agreement on the right palm

Maria Valtorta (1897-1961), Italian mystic and author of the Poème de l'Homme-Dieu, likewise describes the Crucifixion with unusual anatomical precision. Her text is not approved in the same way as Emmerich's, and the prudent discernment required for any private revelation applies. In her vision of the Crucifixion, Valtorta likewise describes the first nail entering the right hand, without stating with the same clarity that the palm is the point of entry^[37]. The dislocation of the left arm is not absent from her descriptions, but formulated differently.

Luisa Piccarreta and the 24 Hours of the Passion

Luisa Piccarreta (1865-1947), Servant of God and author of the Livre du Ciel, composed the Heures de la Passion de Notre-Seigneur Jésus-Christ (1914), an hour-by-hour meditation on the last twenty-four hours of Christ^[38]. This text received, in Luisa's lifetime, the nihil obstat of her censor Saint Annibale Maria Di Francia and the imprimatur of Mgr Giuseppe Maria Leo, Archbishop of Trani — a permission to print, not an approval of the content^[39]. The Heures de la Passion are, however, primarily meditative and contemplative in nature — they do not constitute an anatomical visionary narrative comparable to Emmerich's Révélations. Luisa describes the sufferings of the Crucifixion in a spiritual language of identification and union, without entering into the mechanical detail of the position of the nails^[40].

The chapter devoted to the hour of the Crucifixion invites the soul to unite itself to Jesus by bearing the nails, but does not settle the anatomical question. This must be stated honestly: Luisa Piccarreta's visions contribute no further data on the location of the nails beyond what Emmerich and Valtorta describe.

Status of what follows. The dislocation of the left arm is not an established fact on the same level as Scripture or the anatomical experiments of Barbet and Zugibe: it is a hypothesis built from a private revelation (Emmerich, via Brentano's transcription — see the caveat above), to be received with the prudent discernment due to that level of authority. What follows stands as a possible harmonization, not as a certainty.

The badly measured cross — origin of the problem

Emmerich's narrative contains a concrete datum, verifiable in the mechanical sense: the holes of the cross had been bored too far apart. This error is not an unimportant narrative detail: it explains everything that follows. The executioners had calculated the spread of the arms before the crucifixion, perhaps measuring on the ground or on another body, and the space between the two holes exceeded the natural length of Christ's two outstretched arms^[41].

"When his arm was stretched onto the right arm of the cross, the executioner saw that the left arm did not reach the hole intended for the nail. The cross had been measured on another man, and the hole had perhaps been made too far away."^[42]

No ancient source attests a practice of pre-bored crosses: this is a mechanical hypothesis internal to Emmerich's narrative alone — if the holes had been bored in advance and spaced too widely, the executioners had no other solution than to pull the arm until the hand reached the hole.

The right hand: the blessed palm

The right hand of Christ is nailed first. Emmerich sees the nail entering the palm (into the palm of that hand which had so often blessed men). This formulation is not incidental: it underlines the symbolic continuity between the hand that blessed and the hand now pierced at the centre of the palm. The location corresponds exactly to what Zugibe describes as the optimal position: between metacarpals 2 and 3, in the deep palm.

The left arm: dislocation and wrist

The left hand, on the other hand, cannot be nailed in the same place. The arm having been pulled by force beyond its natural range, with the shoulder joints dislocated, the entire geometry of the left upper limb is altered. The forearm is drawn outward and downward; the wrist ends up in the position where the hole in the cross lies. The nail is driven where the hand arrives, that is, in the carpal area — the wrist.

This mechanism explains several data at once:

1. The image of the Shroud: the left hand — the one visible in the dorsal image — shows a higher wound, in the wrist/base-of-palm area, while the right hand (on top) is less legible. The wound observed on the left hand of the Shroud corresponds to what a nail driven through the wrist of a dislocated arm would produce^[43].

2. Psalm 22: "all my bones are out of joint" — the dislocation of the shoulders described by Emmerich gives this verse a physical as well as a spiritual scope.

3. Consistency with Barbet and Zugibe: Barbet was right that one of the nails was in the wrist-carpus area; Zugibe was right that the other was in the deep palm. Both studied general cases, without factoring in the variable of dislocation on one side only.

Summary of the harmonious theory

This theory is not an artificial harmonization: it reads the source data by trusting them instead of forcing their silence. Emmerich describes two different gestures for the two hands. Anatomy explains why they produce two different nail positions. The Shroud shows an asymmetry consistent with this difference.

Why the stigmata generally appear on the palms

The great majority of stigmatics in the history of the Church bear their visible wounds in the palms — not in the wrists. Saint Francis of Assisi (d. 1226), Saint Veronica Giuliani (d. 1727), Saint Gemma Galgani (d. 1903): in these cases, the wounds lie in the palm, often at the centre of the hand^[44]. Saint Catherine of Siena (d. 1380), who received the stigmata at Pisa in 1375, asked that they remain invisible: in her lifetime, no palmar wound was visible on her body^[45].

If the harmonious theory is correct, this is consistent: the right hand of Christ is nailed through the palm. It is the first hand nailed, the hand that blesses, the hand toward which devotions naturally turn. It is not surprising that most stigmatics receive the wound of Christ's right hand — the palm wound.

Cases of stigmata at the wrist

Some stigmatics receive wounds in the wrist area rather than the palm. This fact, often noted as an anomaly, ceases to be problematic if the harmonious theory is admitted: these stigmatics then receive the wound of the dislocated left arm, a non-symmetrical position different from that of the right hand^[46].

The case of Padre Pio

Saint Padre Pio (1887-1968) is one of the most medically documented cases of stigmata of the 20th century. His canonizer, John Paul II, recognized the authenticity of his life of holiness. Padre Pio's wounds were examined by several physicians. Zugibe notes that Padre Pio's wounds lay not in the central palm but in line with the index and middle fingers (in the deep palm between the second and third metacarpals) — precisely matching his own anatomical theory^[47].

"Padre Pio's stigmata were located where anatomy dictates the nail must pass to support body weight: between the 2nd and 3rd metacarpals of the deep palm." — Frederick T. Zugibe, The Cross and the Shroud, Paragon House, 1988, p. 89^[48]

This placement is consistent with Zugibe's deep-palm theory, and therefore, within the harmonious theory, with Christ's right hand nailed through the palm.

The question of the symmetric objection

A frequent objection runs as follows: if Jesus had one wound in the palm and one in the wrist, how could Thomas have put his finger into "the mark of the nails" without further specification? The objection is not decisive: Thomas speaks of both wounds, and both are indeed nail marks — one in the palm, the other in the wrist. The Greek language does not require a precision of location that the context of the apparition does not call for^[49]. John shows the Risen Christ presenting his hands — both hands — with the wounds visible. The dialogue does not imply an absolute symmetry of the wounds, only their reality.

The six sources of the case file — artistic tradition, scriptural data, Barbet's experiments, Zugibe's experiments, Emmerich's visions, the image of the Shroud and the historical distribution of the stigmata — can be synthesized as follows. The ✅ column indicates compatibility with the source; ❌ incompatibility; ⚠ partial or ambiguous compatibility.

The table clearly shows that only the harmonious theory (right palm + left wrist) does justice to all the testimonies without eliminating any of them. It is the only position compatible with: the artistic tradition (right palm), the scriptural data (χεῖρας), Emmerich's vision (right palm + left dislocation), the image of the Shroud (higher left wound), and the location of most stigmata (palm = Christ's right hand).

"The artistic tradition can be mistaken"

Objection: Artists depicted the palms because it was visually more legible, not because it was anatomically exact.

Answer: The artistic tradition of the first centuries is not ornamental fancy. The earliest depictions of the Crucifixion (5th century) predate modern anatomical discussions by more than a thousand years. They reflect the memory of a community whose faith was still nourished by the direct transmission of witnesses. Moreover, the harmonious theory does not contradict the artistic tradition: it affirms that one of the hands is indeed in the palm (the right), which explains why artists, unaware of the dislocation of the left arm, depicted both hands in the same way^[50].

"Emmerich is not a reliable source"

Objection: Emmerich's visions were transcribed by Brentano and may be coloured by his own imagination. They cannot serve as scientific proof.

Answer: The Church does not propose Emmerich's visions as a mandatory object of faith — no one is bound to believe them. But the beatification of Emmerich in 2004 by John Paul II means that the Church recognizes her heroic virtues and does not consider her visions contrary to faith or morals^[51]. The criterion of admissibility is not absolute certainty but consistency: Emmerich's narrative is consistent with the anatomy of dislocation, with the image of the Shroud and with the historical distribution of the stigmata. That is enough to make it a serious source in theological and historical reflection^[52].

"Zugibe undermines the main argument for the authenticity of the Shroud"

Objection: If Zugibe is right that the thumbs are retracted by simple post-mortem flexion and not by median nerve lesion, Barbet's argument for the authenticity of the Shroud (retracted thumb = proof of a nail in the wrist) collapses.

Answer: This objection is legitimate on the epistemological level. It simply means that the thumb argument alone does not prove the wrist, and therefore does not alone prove the location of the nails. This does not affect the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin, which rests on many other independent arguments (photographic negative image, human blood, three-dimensional rendering of the image, absence of paint pigment according to Heller and Adler — a result contested by McCrone)^[53]. One argument fewer does not erase a case file^[54].

The palm that blessed, the arm that was dislocated

The question of the nails is not a purely archaeological exercise. It touches the heart of the mystery of the Passion. If Christ's right hand was nailed through the palm that had blessed, it is the very act of blessing that is offered on the cross. If the left arm was dislocated until the hand met its nail, it is Christ's entire body that is delivered without reserve — to the point of dislocation — for our salvation.

The dislocation of the left arm described by Emmerich also fulfils the Psalm:

"I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax: it has melted within my breast." — Psalm 22 (21), verse 15^[55]

The prophecy of Isaiah, seven centuries before the cross, anticipates in the same way the body broken in its members:

"But he was wounded for our crimes, crushed for our sins. The punishment that gives us peace fell upon him, and it is by his wounds that we are healed." — Isaiah 53:5^[56]

The Hebrew וּבַחֲבֻרָתוֹ (ouvehabourato), translated as wounds, means "by his bruises, by his contusions" (root חַבּוּרָה, habbourah: bruise, mark of blows — cf. BDB): it designates the body bruised by the blows received, not a dislocated joint^[57]. This verse therefore announces the Servant with a body broken by suffering, without establishing any link to a dislocation of the shoulder.

The variety of the stigmata, a reflection of the real Passion

The mystics who received the stigmata shared, in their flesh, in one aspect of this Passion — some the blessing palm of the right hand, others the dislocated wrist of the left arm. In both cases, it is the same crucified love communicating itself, according to the form and measure God freely chooses for each soul^[58].

This mystery invites contemplation more than absolute certainty. The Church does not define the exact location of the nails as an article of faith. What the unanimous tradition — artistic, scriptural, mystical and anatomical — allows us to affirm with confidence is that Christ's hands were truly pierced, that these wounds were real and identifiable, and that they were shown to the apostles after the Resurrection as a sign of the continuity between the Crucified and the Risen Christ^[59].

"Then he said to Thomas: 'Put your finger here, and see my hands; reach out your hand, and put it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing.'" — Saint John, Gospel of John 20:27^[60]

This gesture of Thomas — touching not only the wounds of the feet or the side, but the hands of the Risen Christ — is the ultimate Gospel attestation that the wounds of the hands are physically locatable. Whatever the exact placement of the nails, they are real, they remain in the glorified flesh of the Risen Christ, and they constitute, for the whole history of Catholic mysticism, the ultimate source of the stigmata.

• Stigmatics — overview of cases in Catholic history, from Saint Francis of Assisi to Padre Pio.
• The Shroud of Turin — complete case file on the image of the Shroud and the arguments for its authenticity.
• Discernment of supernatural phenomena — how the Church evaluates private revelations.
• Luisa Piccarreta — the Heures de la Passion and the spirituality of the Divine Will.
• Maria Valtorta — the Poème de l'Homme-Dieu and the visions of the Passion.